Customer Reviews

Alien Nation: Common Sense About America's Immigration Disaster

5 star:		(35)
4 star:		(9)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(25)

 

 

People who are labeling this author "racist" are very ignorant. I live in L.A. and see first-hand what the out-of-control immigration is doing to this city. Neighborhoods that were once beautiful and safe are now over-populated & dirty & full of crime. This issue needs to be addressed and quickly before further damage is done to this country because of ignorance, liberalism and "tolerance".

An excellent exposition on the current state of immigration. What I found interesting of the negative reviews were that more often than not, the reviewer didn't identify themselves.

Anyway, as to the book itself, Brimelow merely shows what immigration has been like for the US historically. Truth be told, the founders never intended for this to be a "multicultural" country. If one reads the Federalist Papers (which I've reviewed here), you discover that the founders were counting on the "common heritage" of the people to help make the new country work. As Brimelow shows, multiculturalism is of recent vintage (1960 and later).

The underpinning of any country is the commonality of its people: race/ethnicity, language, customs, religion, etc. What Brimelow is saying in this book is that underpinning is being eroded, and the consequences don't bode well for the future. Despite what some reviewers here say, Brimelow doesn't speak disparagingly about current immigrants. His point is that these new immigrants are not inclined to be assimilated, as previous waves were. I think he hits the nail on the head when he says that the current view on immigration is that it's a "civil right" (i.e., everyone has a right to come to America). No other country I know of is thought of in this way.

His emphasis on the fact that the US was/is a primarily white nation is not racist; it's merely stating fact. There's no talk about what race is "better", only that commonality is better. I think the charges of xenophobia by some reviewers are entirely specious.

What has led every great nation/empire to ruin: taking in peoples it can't assimilate or who don't want to be. Our collapse will be unavoidable. Rome lasted 476 years; I doubt we'll reach that.

This is a great, great book. Read it, and then use it by writing your representatives and tell them to turn off the spigot. As Brimelow points out, most Americans are opposed to further foreign immigration and yet it continues. Why? He doesn't answer that question directly -- that's another story.

Who would have thought back in 1965-70, when America's current immigration binge began, that by 2005 many US lawmakers would be championing driver's license rights for US lawbreakers? Or that our nation's borders would be so overrun that ordinary citizens, like retired law officers, assorted concerned grandparents, and a surprising number of Hispanics (all of whom were recently characterized by "New York Times" columnist David Brooks as "beer-swilling good old boys") would feel compelled to travel to the border with binoculars and lawn chairs and politely try to alert our undermanned Border Patrol about specific acts of blatant lawbreaking, all in the desperate hope of getting their own elected government to begin caring about border security for a nation that does not end in "q" or "stan"?

Well, judging by the foresight demonstrated in "Alien Nation," Peter Brimelow is probably one of the Americans least surprised by all this. And, as discussed in his book, illegal immigration is only part of the problem. The US is taking in more legal immigrants than all other nations combined. So when it comes to our grandchildren someday being able to enjoy America's remaining open spaces and wildlands, the government might as well be conducting an Anti-Homeland Environment military campaign utilizing modified B-52 carpet-bomb-paving cement mixers.

Brimelow also has the courage to address the ethnic factor. One US Immigration and Naturalization Service Commissioner once breathlessly proclaimed that America's rapid immigration-induced demographic shift means that we are all becoming "wonderfully transformed." This is pretty much in keeping with today's in-vogue type of racism: an ever smaller percentage of white people equals an ever more peachy world. (If this were true Haiti would be Shangri-La.)

But it is more complicated than that. Brimelow, with his unblinking understanding of history, recognizes the fundamental importance of any particular founding ethnic majority to that nation's continued existence. The dreamy counter-argument to Brimelow's common sense one seems to be that we Americans--and to some extent all Westerners--represent some sort of new, highly evolved neutral fairness-monitoring creatures. (In a 1950s science fiction film we would probably be represented by hovering blue lights of pure reason.) It is assumed that we are the first society in history that will remain largely unaffected by any future changes in majority ethnicity, race or religion, since never-ending millions of immigrants will simply absorb the wonderfulness our ways and our universal democratic values. One problema: our "universal" values, which are the foundation of our democratic institutions, grow almost entirely out of the centuries-long traditions of European peoples.

It is a little as if Chinese elites had convinced themselves that China's traditional core values are simply universal truisms. All China need do is happily inculcate hundreds of millions of newcomers into how to be properly Chinese, and Chinese civilization will not only continue to move majestically forward, but will be wonderfully transformed, strengthened and enriched by its new majority of Italians or Eskimos.

Of course America is not China. From the beginning we have been more diverse and inclusive, but our core founding culture is no less unique; it is not a rubber band that can be stretched to infinity. What was so unsettling about the 1982 film "Blade Runner" was not that America had been overrun by any particular race, but how thoroughly alien Los Angeles had become to Western civilization, and how eerily plausible it somehow seemed.

If our culture, our environment, and our form of government can somehow be saved from this coming Bladerunnerization, the calm, erudite, witty, systematic and devastating arguments of Peter Brimelow, a true patriot, will be partly responsible. All who care about America and Western civilization should read Brimelow's brilliant and historic "Alien Nation."

The systematic anti-European bias of our current immigration policy is not only a war against the people (whites) who created the very civilization for which third-worlders so desire, but a war against the American worker who has to compete with these thralls who will work to see a cock-fight. Peter Brimelow, himself an immigrant and the book's author, thought he moved to America. If he wanted to live in Tijuana, he would have moved there. Frustrated by his observations, he was compelled to write this anti-immigration treatise, and to his credit, he dogged his quarry with diligence.

Brimelow addresses every conceivable argument formulated by those who wish for our present immigration policy to continue. A popular one is the often repeated neo-conservative mantra that America was "built on immigration," but the kind of immigration our founders who "built" our country had in mind was of the European variety. In fact, the first immigration act written in 1790 by the men who signed the Declaration of Independence limited immigration strictly to European Christians, which stands in direct contrast with current immigration law that would today deny our European forefathers entrance. (And besides, when European immigrants arrived on Ellis Island 90 years ago, they didn't have subsidized housing, SSI, and other welfare benefits waiting for them, unlike the Aztec Indians entering our country illegally today that Linda Chavez would love to culturally and dysgenically destroy our country with.) The country was founded not on immigration but on private property rights, as specified in the Federalist Papers, in which John Jay constantly stresses the common brotherhood we--we whites that is--have with Europeans.

Another argument that Brimelow stabs right through the eyes is the one that says "we need these immigrants because if they weren't here picking lettuce it would cost ten bucks a head." Personally, I would rather pay $20 a head than kiss European civilization goodbye, but this isn't the argument Brimelow adopts. Brimelow claims--correctly--that any benefits massive nonwhite immigration brings is easily outweighed by the urban decay, welfare costs, poor academic performance, and reintroduced diseases (like tuberculosis) they also bring along with them.

Shortly after the publication of "Alien Nation," Michigan Senator Spencer Abraham sabotaged the only hope in the last ten years for immigration reform: Section 110 of the 1996 Illegal Immigration Act Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act (IIRIRA), which would've required the government to begin matching entry and exit records of all visitors of the United States. Thankfully, Abraham lost his senate seat. But he isn't alone among the overwhelming majority of politicians, most of whom desperately want to preserve our current open-border policy--Republicans for their cheap labor and Democrats for their cheap cause. We are importing, in essence, people who are illiterate in their own native languages; most of them cannot read or write in their own native Spanish (declining academic standards). Their children very often don't want to be a laborer, and they join gangs (urban decay). All of which is going to erode the country for a short-term gain and greed of those who are behind these decisions. Additionally, when these Aztec Indians "bury us," ("us" whites) who's going to pay their welfare benefits? Why would anyone want this?

To anyone concerned with our nation's future, I couldn't think of a more important book than Peter Brimelow's "Alien Nation."

Ten years ago, the paperback edition of "Alien Nation" came out in print. While some of the numbers may be off (the number of illegals doubled from than of 1996) the basic message remains. The Federal government has no interest in protecting the original character of the United States - namely, as a European republic. It has and continued to act against the interests of the race that that carved out a civilization superseding previous European civilizations. Peter Brimelow's book deserves a second reading, particularly in the midst of the current (one-sided) immigration debate that Congress desperately wants to avoid.

There are the myopic many that love tacos, curry and Thai noodles -- the raging cheerleaders of the "open borders" gang. However, they immediately shut up when the sieve that is our current immigration policy allows Middle Easterners to bomb or crash planes into our buildings. They turn a deaf ear to the fact that greedy businesses hire illegals at firesale wages and boost their own profits. Indeed, the strident open border crowd hasn't said anything about the recent massive demonstrations by Mexican flag waving illegal mestizos and non-white Hispanics -- other than "let them all in!". Senators Kennedy's and Javitz's pronouncement of 1965 was proven wrong: America's has dramatically changed and for the worse. The "Irish beer" swilling, taco eating Americans have learned nothing.

In 1965, the United States government enacted a new Immigration Act, an act that was intended to correct certain problems with the country's immigration policy, by making family reunification easier and by allowing more non-Western immigrants. The supporters of the act widely proclaimed that it would have only a minor impact on immigration, and a marginal impact on the demographics of the country. Within some 20 years, it became evident that this Act had radically altered immigration into the United States, starting a great wave of immigration from Third World countries, giving the country the largest percentage of immigrants that it had had since the height of the 19th century immigration wave.

In this book, author Peter Brimelow, himself an immigrant from Great Britain, examines the effects that this great immigration flood has produced, and finds that it has been nothing but a disaster. With a wealth of statistics, he examines the composition of the new immigrants (largely uneducated and unskilled), what effects they have already had, and what effects they are likely to have in the future. He is not sanguine about the future that this new immigration policy is building, comparing the United States to a lifeboat to whom so many are swimming that it is in danger of capsizing.

The greatest knock against this book is that Mr. Brimelow has the temerity to actually discuss race within his book. However, his arguments are not as radical as they might seem. In his 1996 book, The Clash of Civilizations, author Samuel Huntington discusses the effects of massive immigration of people from other "civilizations" into the United States, making it a fault-line nation (where inter-civilizational conflicts can impact), and his conclusions are much the same.

I found this book to be quite interesting, and very well reasoned. Therefore, if you are interested in the future of the United States, or are interested in the concept of America as a fault-line nation, then I highly recommend this book.

Brimelow is a brave man wo dares to speak to one of our surmounting problems, when no one else will.

The only disappointment I had in this book was that it is not a 'best seller.' Brimelow examines the inherent threat and danger to our American society and culture brought about by our current governmental immigration policies. He points out that currently we have between four and five million illegal aliens in the United States, and another one-an-a-half million legal immigrants. Moreover, many of them find it painful to assimilate into our society, sometimes because of racial or religious antagonisms, i.e.: radical Muslims, or people of color like Colin Ferguson, who killed several people on a train in New York because he hated whites.

Brimelow also points out, accurately, that our origins (except for the native aborigines) were white Europeans, and most of them, like him, of British derivation and protestant Christian faith.

Further, Mr. Brimelow notes, that the vast majority of native-born Americans are not in favor of the great wave of immigrants that currently inundate us, and that are changing the entire face of our population. But, they have little voice in the matter: the decisions are being made at the political level, quietly. Illegals are being granted amnesty and granted citizenship without demonstrating fluency in English, and increasing numbers are 'language isolated,' with no one in the household speaking English, formerly a requirement for citizenship. Huge numbers of illegals near our southern border come her solely to give birth, so that their children will become citizens and eligible for welfare and free medical care.

Brimelow also assesses the cost to our school system, faced with millions of kids who are not sufficiently skilled in English, and so burden the system with extra cost, since they still must be educated--in their own language.

In short, our sieve-like borders and our political immigration policies--often liberalized solely to attract more voters of the political flavor sought by the politicians, are swamping us. Historically, for example, Hispanics can be counted on to vote Democrat, and so Democrat lawmakers smile at relaxed immigration.

How does it impact us, individually? I can recall, during the Second World War and the Korean 'Police Action,' when the people on the streets of this nation--no matter where you went--spoke, virtually exclusively, the English language, and looked and dressed similarly. We had a national identity. Now, we have a polyglot population. In stores we are assailed by a babble of Spanish, Vietnamese, and other languages too many to number.

Instead of a 'melting pot,' a unifying goal to establish a national identity, the unspoken but assumed goal of everyone was to assimilate into our national identity. Today we are being bombarded with the propaganda of 'multi-culturism,' as if that were a desirable thing, but rather than unifying, it is divisive. It breaks us into groups who are often at odds: blacks, Hispanics, Koreans, Chinese, Vietnamese, Japanese, Women, Catholics, protestants, etc. It is as if there was a conscious effort being made to divide us, so that we then could be more easily conquered, piecemeal.

And our population is growing by leaps and bounds, creating overcrowding in our cities, and contributing to crime and unrest; not as a result of natural factors like childbirth surpassing the death rate, but as a result of the influx of immigrants--both legal and illegal.

We are being swamped, and without the consent of the citizens and residents of this land of abundance, but rather by elected politicians and unelected bureaucrats who need to turn off the spigot, and stop the flood, instead od using it to further their own political agenda.

'Take back our country' has another meaning than the sophomoric chant of the political flacks in an election year. We need to stop the alien horde, and keep it from destroying our national character.

We can still take strangers into our borders, but selectively, judging whether they will be an asset to us, and can reasonably be expected to support themselves, and looking at their backgrounds, individually. Brimelow thinks we must. So do I.

Joseph (Joe) Pierre

By stripping "Alien Nation" of the emotionalism and bigotry of other works critical of immigration, Brimelow's exhaustive examination of the most current wave of immigration and its implications succeeds in its argument that immigration policy needs to change radically where others have failed. Why? Because, as he argues, it really is about the numbers, not about ethnicity. This is an important distinction, one that raises Alien Nation far above the other books critical of immigration policy that offer little besides xenophobia and hatred.

As an economist, Brimelow is able to neatly sidestep the pathos and sentimentalism currently dominating immigration debate, and dissect the issue rationally. Are we a nation of immigrants? Absolutely, he argues, but America has always had a chance to pause for digestion after each wave of mass immigration which is something missing this time. Historically, he points out, there has never been a precedent for what we're seeing now and he rightly questions why we think a social experiment this radical will be successful. Sure, it might work. But what if it doesn't?

Chapter by chapter he manages to skewer all the arguments held up to keep the current level of immigration where it is unchecked and shows, with concrete proof, what is happening in America today and what will happen if our immigration policy isn't reformed and reformed fast. Anyone concerned about the declining quality of public schools, our overburdened health care system, the stagnation of real wages, the effects of urban sprawl on the environment, and most importantly, the plight of the immigrants themselves needs to read this book. Brimelow makes clear in his book that no one benefits in a system where resources are taxed to the point of scarcity by the sheer number of people relying on them.

Two of the most compelling questions Brimelow raises in response to the knee-jerk defense of multi-culturalism are good ones: what is it about America that immigration crusaders think needs to be transformed? What about America has so alienated them that they think mass immigration is the answer? And what makes us think that if America becomes Balkanized, pieced off into ethnic factions, that we'll fare any better as a nation than Yugoslavia, Palestine, or Lebanon?

Brimelow believes a lot of people would be wise to start asking themselves these questions. Do we want the nation to be just like Yugoslavia? For our sake, he hopes the answer is no.

It is sad that there are so many who despise works that dare to criticize America's ludicrous immigration policies. Sad, and a little bit funny. Every empire that's ever fallen has done so through overextension and through the failure to assimilate their subjugated peoples. You'd think that most people would have figured this out by now, and would have seen that America is blindly stumbling into these same problems. But as George Bernard Shaw stated: "We learn from experience that men never learn anything from experience."

I find it even sadder (or funnier) that so many here apply the 'racist' label upon Mr. Brimelow's work. Bow down to the Altar of Diversity, or be forsaken, it seems. Those so obsessed with preaching `tolerance' are woefully adverse to any dissenting opinion on the subject of race. "The races are exactly the same," you know. Race is just a "social construct." Of course, the dramatic differences between the races have been carefully catalogued--they differ startlingly, from varying brain sizes to incompatible bone marrow--but don't expect a racial nihilist to point this out to you, and don't expect to read it in the Sunday paper, either. That would be `racist.' God forbid.

Indeed, multiculturalism is a horribly illogical train of thought, regardless of whether or not the races are identical. It operates on the oh-so-brilliant assumption that all cultures are equally desirable. Of course, ask a multiculturalist whether he'd prefer immigrants that were culturally Nazi, or culturally democratic, and he'll tell you democratic, nine times out of ten. So much for the `all cultures are equal' tripe. There are those like myself, who contend that certain cultures--oh say, the culture of Mexicans--are less desirable than others, judging from valuable little trinkets like crime statistics. Of course, I, and those like me, are irredeemably Evil. I guess we're `culturists'--a term I fully expect to be used one day. Hey, we've already got `racism' and `sexism' and `homophobism'--why not add another member to the Hall of the Horrible Isms?

~Alien Nation: Common Sense About America's Immigration Disaster~ by National Review journalist Peter Brimelow is a welcomed refutation of America's open borders immigration policy. America is besieged by an onslaught of Third World immigration - illegal and legal - which is now and will continue to radically transform the American demographic. Moreover, the culture, institutions, religion, character and ethnic core of America will change in the process. National Review journalist Peter Brimelow, an immigrant himself of British extraction, makes a compelling case against the unmitigated tide of immigration on economic, environmental and (gulp) cultural grounds. America embraces an immigration myth, which doesn't mesh with history: this myth posits America to be the first 'universal nation.' Founding Father and Federalist John Jay, characterized Americans as "one united people - a people descended from the same ancestors, speaking the same language, professing the same religion, attached to the same principles of government, very similar in their manners and customs." Also, Brimelow points out some of the more absurd economic arguments by immigration enthusiasts and the hypocrisy of nations that send us droves of their emmigrants while restricting their own immigration. Why do they do that? Because they're too poor, too populated and do not have the economic strength to handle the influx. Yet we're told in the U.S. immigration doesn't displace workers, it complements them. Shouldn't it work both ways. Hmmm... The conventional immigration mystique holds the immigrant to be hard-working, productive and an asset to the economy. Nonetheless, the stark economic facts suggest this is quite to the contrary. A greater percentage of immigrants are on welfare than natives. Immigrants make up one-quarter of the federal penitentiary inmates. Immigrants are seldom productive as given credit for considering their huge consumption of resources: education, health care, welfare and other taxpayer subsidized services.

Advocates of open borders immigration who are alarmed at the multicultural Balkan stratification that is common to the new influx of immigrants may be missing the point if they think assimilation or assent to an elusive "America creed" is even tenable. Given the motley crue of Aztalan enthusiasts that loathe Anglos and Jihad warriors swimming onto our shores, the idea of assimilation being remotely feasible must be swept to the wayside. The new wave of immigrants by and large have no intent of embracing the culture and ways of America. Not surprisingly, the future of America looks bleak with a stratified, hostile, multi-ethnic populace isolated in Balkanized enclaves. Middle America is alienated by the power elites who ignore their cries to shut off the immigration floodgates despite the unpopularity of immigration whether legal or illegal. If America doesn't address the issue soon, the traditional culture, institutions and faith, that America so cherishes will be drowned out. The 1965 Immigration Act with its open borders policy, its preference for Third World immigrants and lax enforcement of illegal entries needs to be scrapped. Somehow, I doubt the Brave New World taking shape will have any reverence for Christianity or the republican institutions of the Anglo-American founders in 2050. Perhaps, Pat Buchanan is right and a moratorium or freeze on immigration is in order.

...